


An Understanding

by penscritch



Series: The Mob Boss AU [1]
Category: John Wick (Movies), The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System (人渣反派自救系统), 人渣反派自救系统 - 墨香铜臭 | Rén Zhā Fǎn Pài Zì Jiù Xì Tǒng - Mòxiāng Tóngshiù
Genre: Crossover, F/M, Luo Binghe makes the High Table pee their pants, M/M, mob boss!Luo Binghe, post-John Wick 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2019-02-01 14:09:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12706560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penscritch/pseuds/penscritch
Summary: If mob boss!Luo Binghe ever met John Wick.





	An Understanding

John Wick was three-quarters dead and grimly determined to live even if he was now being escorted into the office of one of the most feared people in the world.

A tall man sat behind the desk, sorting through paperwork. He had the black hair and black eyes characteristic of the Chinese and something colder and chilling that belonged to him entirely.

He rose and shook hands with John, gesturing him to sit, while John tried not to think about his chances of leaving alive.

Luo Binghe was not the sort of man who left loose ends. He belonged to the old school of salt-and-burn that predated the idea of vendetta, a breed that had long since died out in the world and frankly terrified the High Table.

Their terror was justified. This was a man who was not only self-made but had killed a good two-thirds of the Asian underground and the entire preceding High Table when they sent orders to dispose of him, establishing himself as a major independent power. The new High Table knew better than to step on his toes with the preceding, deceased generation serving a good example.

John Wick counted himself fortunate for never running into him before. He didn’t know why he was here and only the knowledge that offending this man before they even had a conversation would be incredibly fucking stupid kept him from breaking away.

“We’re both busy men and I’ll keep this short,” he said. “Why are you in my territory?”

Even John Wick needed a break. He ran to the only place the High Table was afraid to breach to recuperate. He planned to stay low but didn’t expect to be found out so soon.

“To heal.”

Luo Binghe studied him with eyes as cool and clear as the glacial ice he was named after. “You realize that you are playing a dangerous game?”

“I stayed low. Only you found me.”

He studied him a moment longer. John’s hand itched for his gun but he knew better than to draw.

Then he asked a strange question.

“She was your peace, wasn’t she?”

John Wick stared at him silently, then nodded.

Luo Binghe smiled suddenly. It was uncharacteristically soft for a man as feared as he was, someone that even the High Table didn’t dare offend.

“My men won’t hunt you,” he said, “though I won’t stop anyone else.”

John was too weary to be surprised at this gift of grace, and grace it was. Despite the deceptive nature of his words, Luo Binghe brooked no intruders in his territory. Anyone who ‘intruded’ on his turf died along with their backers, often horribly.

John had broken ribs and had been running on caffeine and sheer will for three days. He didn’t have the energy to think too much about it, especially since he wasn’t pressured into offering a marker.

“Thanks,” he managed. Still, it wasn’t enough to overcome his paranoia over just why this man spared him and he had to ask: “Why?”

It was Luo Binghe’s turn to pause. He looked down at the ring on his finger, then at the picture on his desk. He held another man close in a clearly intimate embrace, his lover – spouse, if that ring meant anything – whose handsomeness was soft like the watercolors Helen loved. There was a calmness and grace to him, apparent even in the picture, that John supposed must have been what appealed to him.

Luo Binghe finally said: “Because if someone took my peace away from me, this world would not exist.”

Even John Wick, boogeyman that he was, felt cold run into his bones at that calm statement.

John Wick left the office of the most feared man in the world with a new lease on life, more than ever conscious of how precious it was.


End file.
